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"To minimize the environmental impact while still doing cutting edge chemistry." That is the basic theory behind Green Chemistry that drives Umass Lowell Graduate Student Benjamin Bowers. Born in Lansing, Michigan it wasn't until he was working as an advisor in Kalamazoo, Michigan, in industry for two years, that Bowers learned of the new field of Green Chemistry. Bowers, who has now been at UML for six months, heard about Green Chemistry from a friend. From Bowers experiences in industry he discovered that the many companies accumulate massive amounts of environmentally hazardous waste, and decided to pursue his graduate degree in Green Chemistry in order to alleviate some of that unnecessary waster build up. As the only school offering a PhD in Green Chemistry, Bowers applied to Umass Lowell to study under John Warner the founder of all the main theories concerning the field of Green Chemistry.
With a degree in Green Chemistry Bowers will be able to use his degree in any of three fields, those being industry, academia, and government. Personally, Bowers is leaning toward the academia category of Green Chemistry. To Bowers teaching is "interesting and its preparing people to go forward and make the next step in Green Chemistry." Due to the fact that the field of Green Chemistry is a fresh new topic, there exists many job opportunities through at all of the fields of industry, academia, and government. So much so that it takes at "longest 2-3 weeks to get a job." as said by Bowers and department head John Warner. It appears to be the scarcity and demand of this major that yields itself to such great job opportunities. As the only PhD program in Green Chemistry, Umass Lowell's graduate program has currently only 14-15 students enrolled currently. Imposingly, the strong need by large companies to produce environmentally safe products helps to insure that all the current students in Green Chemistry will have an extremely good chance of being gainfully employed. Bowers's personal research, in his studies, at this time, is dealing with "non-covalent derivitization". Where he is "looking at manipulating the physical properties of a molecule", and doing so by the "making and breaking of covalent bonds." However, Bowers did admit that Green Chemistry is a rather demanding field in which to study. Staying that the "downsides are your going back to school. Usually putting in 60-80 hours a week. So there's a big time commitment." On a positive note Bowers went on to say, "In 4 years you will walk out with a Ph.D. degree. And you will be able to do what you want to do, where you want to do it." |